Return of the Assassin (Assassin Series 3) (11 page)

“No matter how it plays out, we win,” Paolo echoed.

“Exactly. And more importantly, this will be the beginning of the end for Los Zetas. They’ve become too brazen for their own good, and they forget who the Godfather handed the reins to originally. They didn’t even exist back then. It will be very satisfying to teach them to respect their elders…” Aranas smiled at the thought. “Gentlemen, the reason I asked you to join me for the day is to ensure we have our strategy mapped out, as well as to have a little fun. We’ll put in at Curaçao, have a party, and then you can return to business tomorrow. I’ll get the helicopter to take you to the Caracas airport by noon, so you can be back in Mexico in time for cocktails.”

Rodrigo raised his mimosa and toasted their patriarch. “I’ll drink to that. To the
Don
!”

The men hoisted their glasses aloft, a sense of triumph lingering in the salon. The head of the Sinaloa cartel had done it again.

It was only a matter of time until they were back on top and navigating tranquil waters.

~

“What have we learned, people? What’s the plan?” Cruz scanned the faces of his subordinates before settling his eyes on Briones.

“There’s obviously something going on at the site besides manufacturing cleaning products. The one building at the far edge of the property does indeed look suspicious. We’ve spotted a few men coming and going in SUVs, but that’s hardly conclusive. At best, it confirms that it’s not just a storage building or equipment repair hub. But I’d be hard pressed to go on the record saying that it’s a meth lab. We just don’t have enough data,” Briones reported.

“I don’t see any way around a frontal assault. We’ve studied the layout, and there’s no other solution. If we had a few more days…” Ricardo cautioned.

Cruz shook his head. “I’ve talked with General Obregon, and he’s preparing a support group as we speak, to go in tonight. We’ll have armored backup, two platoons of soldiers, a company of fifty GAFE commandos and as many
Federales
as we require. The soldiers will be responsible for surrounding the facility. The GAFE will work with our strike force during the actual assault. Ricardo, how many men do you think we’ll need?” Cruz asked.

Ricardo considered the question carefully. The GAFE,
Grupo Aeromovil de Fuerzas Especial de Alta Mando
, was the most experienced and lethal special forces group in the Mexican armed forces. Specially trained in counter-terrorism and urban assault, the GAFE was the equivalent of the U.S. Delta Force crossed with the SEALS. A rarified group of less than a hundred men, the commandos were rumored to have a license to kill without question – the legendary ‘white card’. If they were going to be part of the assault it was being taken extremely seriously at the highest level of the government.

“If the informant is right, and there are at least twenty Los Zetas soldiers there, I’d say fifty
Federales
, along with the GAFE group, should be sufficient. I’d want to pound the building with the armored division before trying to go in, though. No point in risking men if we’re moving on them frontally. But I want to go on record saying I’m uncomfortable, based on the surveillance feed from the water tower so far. I question whether there’s solid enough evidence to warrant a full blown incursion,” Ricardo concluded.

Cruz frowned and nodded. “Noted. But the decision has been made. I ran it up the chain of command, and everyone agrees that we need to move quickly. We’ve interrogated the informant for hours and his story hangs together. He’s got no reason to feed us lies – he knows it will go far harder on him if the information is spurious. It’s been made clear in unmistakable terms.” Cruz pointed at the white board with a diagram of the target on it. “Consider this an active operation. I want to hit at eleven tonight. Round up the necessary manpower and get me a list of whatever hardware and vehicles we’ll need. I think we plan to ram through the front gates if the security crew doesn’t open up on the first demand, blow the iron gates on the target area, then rush the building, assuming there’s no defensive fire. If anyone starts shooting at us, we let them have it with both barrels from the armored units until there’s no further resistance. Then our men move in. I’ll leave you with Lieutenant Briones to sort out the logistics. But plan on mobilizing in,” Cruz glanced at his watch, “six and a half hours. Refer any questions directly to me.”

The meeting continued once Cruz had left the room, anxious to coordinate the armed forces support. It would be a long remainder of the day – these types of operations demanded at least two more lengthy meetings with the general and his staff, as well as the other armed forces heads. Cruz went to the restroom and rinsed off his face with cool water, trying to rally some adrenaline for the marathon to come. If he was lucky, it would be over by one a.m. and he could be in bed by four. That was assuming no complications.

And there were inevitably complications.

He moved to his office and called Dinah with the bad news. It looked like it would be another all-nighter. She was understanding, but concerned. He assured her that he wasn’t going to be in the firefight, instead running the operation from a safe distance. That mollified her, but Dinah’s parting words were still tense, her tone uneasy.

His personal life attended to, he punched up the number for the general on his computer. He peered at the digits and nodded.

It was time to go to war.

El Rey
sat patiently waiting for Hector and his nameless helpers to arrive with the weapons. He’d carefully packed the newly-acquired clothes in a duffel they’d provided and had busied himself poring over the files on the kidnapping, the demand call to the president, and all the intelligence on the suspected whereabouts of key Sinaloa cartel figures.

There were hundreds of pages, but in the end, not much of value. And the clock was ticking. By his estimation, he had four and a half days left before he hit the point where he would require the booster shot, and he hadn’t walked out the door yet. Why it was taking so long to gather the materials he needed likely had something to do with securing them in an untraceable manner. His urgent demands for results that morning had been met with assurances that he’d have everything by five, including a plane and anything else he needed. He suspected that the passport had also presented a more substantial hurdle than they’d been prepared for.

Rather than fighting with Hector over the timing, he preferred to use his time productively, but his patience was wearing thin. Nobody knew where Aranas was, and he’d have to work fast to find someone who might actually know where the girl was being held. That would be a tightly guarded secret – there weren’t many the
Don
would trust with the information – which meant that
El Rey
’s first priority was to locate one of the inner circle, which was populated by some of the most hunted fugitives in Mexico. Even with his contacts and expertise it would be a tall order on short notice.

He hated rush jobs. They ran against every principle he held dear. Being in a hurry resulted in cutting corners and failing to take the time to accurately evaluate risks, which in turn led to botched operations. As the afternoon faded and his watch read five o’clock, his brow furrowed. The government idiots were burning time he didn’t have.

The door to the meeting room opened, interrupting his ruminations. Hector entered, trailed by his two shadows, who were lugging the equipment he’d requested. They set the gear on the table and watched as he methodically checked each item before sliding it off to one side.

The inspection took fifteen minutes. Satisfied that he had everything he needed, he closed the lid on the final container and turned to Hector.

“I will need to get to the airport immediately.”

“I assumed so. We need to know where you’re going so the crew can file a flight plan,” Hector said.

“Culiacán, of course. The heart of the Sinaloa cartel. If I’m going to get answers, I’ll need to start there. Now, how do I get in touch with you when I need my injection? That’s the loose end so far,”
El Rey
warned.

“Use the cell phone I gave you.” Hector patted his breast pocket. “I’ll get someone to you within twenty-four hours, if not sooner.”

“I still think you should give me the syringe. I might be somewhere you can’t easily reach me.”

“Don’t be. I understand the onset of symptoms is highly unpleasant.”

It was pointless to argue. They obviously intended to keep him on a short leash.

El Rey
had verified the signed presidential pardon was everything he’d demanded and had made arrangements for an attorney to keep the original under lock and key. He’d also made a copy of it and uploaded it into an e-mail program. It wasn’t foolproof as a deterrent, but it would have to do. The truth was that if the government really wanted to screw him, it would find a way.

“Have a car waiting in ten minutes. We’ve wasted enough time. Is there anything else?”
El Rey
asked. He pulled the stack of money Hector had set down towards him and methodically counted the bundles of pesos and dollars, then slid them into the bag with the rest of his gear.

“No. Check in every day if you can and update us. We can only help you if we know what you’re doing.”

“Guaranteed you’ll hear from me. I don’t really have a choice, do I?”

“That’s the whole idea.”

~

A haze of pollution created the illusion of an orange full moon over Mexico City. On the outskirts, the dust from unpaved dirt roads worsened the effect, presenting chronic respiratory problems for the unlucky residents. Living downtown resulted in the same damage to the residents’ lungs as smoking a pack of cigarettes a day; the average life expectancy of
Chilangos
, as they were called, was ten years shorter than in other Mexican cities.

Traffic noise had faded as the night wore on, the clamor of population slowing once the dinner hour had come and gone. One by one, the lights went out in the shabby little homes on the periphery of the valley as the tired habitants settled in for sleep.

The target was located in a rural industrial district with no streetlights and only grudging illumination provided by an occasional lamp mounted for security on one of the compounds’ fortified gates. Even the inevitable stray dogs in the neighborhood avoided the darkened streets once the workers had gone home, preferring to forage in the squalid residential district a quarter mile away. The breeze had a smell of toxicity: a dead, chemical aroma of petroleum, solvents and nastiness.

Three security guards armed with shotguns roamed the grounds of the target at night. A cursory records search had revealed that the company had paperwork for the weapons, so the operators were trying to do everything by the book. Strings had been pulled to obtain them, and money had surely changed hands because gun possession in Mexico was ordinarily a felony that carried harsh penalties; getting permits for a business was almost unheard of outside of armored currency transport and bodyguards.

Cruz watched from inside a specially equipped oversized box van as the army trucks moved into position on the perimeter road. From the passenger seat, he nodded to the soldiers as his vehicles rolled past the hastily erected checkpoints.

The command center vehicle coasted to a stop two hundred yards from the compound gates in a dark area beneath a cluster of shabby trees. The screens in the rear sprang to life as two technicians trained the surveillance vehicle’s low-profile roof cameras on the walls.

Cruz glanced at the luminescent face of the dashboard clock. Ten fifty-seven. Three short minutes and all hell would break loose.

The water tower camera feeds had become redundant once night had fallen, with illumination in the compound limited to a few lamps mounted on the walls. The large chemical holding tanks were hulking dark forms in the gloom, and the only activity they’d been able to monitor had been a delivery truck that had rolled out at nine thirty, just before the last of the main building’s lights had been extinguished.

The GAFE commandos and federal police were scheduled to arrive in two minutes.

Cruz’s radio crackled.

“We’ll be on top of you in a blink. Any last minute reprieves?” Briones’ distinctive voice asked.

Cruz depressed the transmit button on the handset. “Negative. Let’s get it over with.”

A line of armored vehicles swung around the corner and approached the van, slowing as they passed. In the lead, four Humvees packed with grim-faced GAFE commandos rolled down the road towards the steel gates, followed by two ERC-90 armored assault vehicles that resembled nothing so much as tanks. Seven Ford Lobo pickup trucks brought up the rear with the federal police strike force riding in the beds, the officers’ body armor giving them the appearance of storm troopers from a futuristic science fiction film.

When the convoy reached the gates, a
Federal
jumped out of the lead truck and pounded on them. Three of the GAFE commandos had descended from their perches and moved into position alongside him, ready to engage if shooting started.

A puzzled security guard slid open a tiny hatch in the gate and peered out, eyes widening when he saw the small army on the other side. After a hurried set of barked orders from the federal policeman, he nodded and, anti-climactically, slid the gates open with a heave. As instructed, he’d placed his shotgun on the ground, and stood in wonder as the procession rolled past him towards the far end of the complex.

One of the
Federales
snatched up his shotgun and wound a set of plastic tie wraps around his wrists. The other two security men came running when they heard the commotion, but quickly dropped their weapons, wanting no part of whatever was taking place. Briones hopped out of the last truck and approached the men.

“How do we get the gate open on the inside compound?” Briones demanded.